Creating a personal portfolio website with a custom domain is a significant milestone for any developer. It reflects your journey, showcases your skills, and acts as your digital identity. In this blog, I'll walk you through how I purchased my domain, configured it with Cloudflare, and connected it to my portfolio hosted on Vercel.
Step 1: Purchasing the Domain
The first step was to buy a domain name that represents my personal brand. I chose golukumar.com and purchased it from Porkbun. Here's why I opted for Porkbun:
Affordable pricing.
Free WHOIS privacy protection.
A clean and intuitive interface.
How to Buy a Domain on Porkbun:
Visit the Porkbun website.
Search for your desired domain name in the search bar.
If the domain is available, click "Add to Cart" and proceed to checkout.
Complete the payment process, and you'll officially own the domain!
Step 2: Configuring Name Servers with Cloudflare
After purchasing the domain, I decided to use Cloudflare for DNS management. Cloudflare offers:
Fast DNS resolution for quicker load times.
Free SSL certificates to secure your site with HTTPS.
Enhanced security against DDoS attacks and other threats.
Steps to Configure Name Servers:
Sign up or log in to your Cloudflare account.
Add your domain to Cloudflare by clicking on "Add a Site" and typing in your domain name.
Cloudflare will scan your existing DNS records. Verify and adjust these if necessary.
Cloudflare will provide two name servers(NS). Go back to Porkbun, navigate to your domain settings, and update the name servers with the ones provided by Cloudflare. You can remove default porkbun NS and update the NS settings.
It may take a few minutes (or up to 24 hours) for the changes to propagate.
Step 3: Deploying My Portfolio on Vercel
Before connecting my domain, I had already deployed my portfolio on Vercel. Vercel is my go-to platform for deploying web applications because of its simplicity and performance.
If you haven't deployed your project yet, here’s a quick guide:
Push your project to a GitHub repository.
Log in to Vercel and click on "New Project".
Import your GitHub repository and configure the project settings.
Click "Deploy", and your portfolio will be live at a temporary Vercel subdomain (e.g.,
myportfolio.vercel.app).
Step 4: Connecting My Custom Domain to Vercel
Once the domain and hosting were ready, the next step was to connect them.
Steps to Add a Custom Domain to Vercel:
In your Vercel dashboard, navigate to your project and go to the Settings tab.
Under Domains, click "Add Domain".
Enter your custom domain name (e.g., golukumar.com) and click "Add".
Vercel will prompt you to verify domain ownership. Since I used Cloudflare, I added the required DNS records in my Cloudflare dashboard.
DNS Records to Add: (Be meticulous)
A Record: Points your domain to Vercel’s IP address.
CNAME Record: Ensures
www.yourdomain.comredirects toyourdomain.com.😝 above details will be in vercel and it will suggest to add this .
Once verified, your custom domain will be live, and your portfolio can be accessed at golukumar.com! 🎉
Step 5: Add ‘A’ and ‘CNAME’ to porkbun
This was the problem faced by me :
Go to porkbun website and click on DNS
add A and in value type @ and save it
again add CNAME add value given in Vercel
here in DNS it’s tells domain to call which ip should be called when someone visit your domain.
Lessons Learned
DNS management is simpler than it seems but requires patience during propagation.
Cloudflare’s free SSL is a lifesaver for securing your site with HTTPS.
Platforms like Vercel make deploying modern web apps effortless.
Visit My Portfolio
Check out my live portfolio here: 🌟 golukumar.com
If you're planning to launch your own website and have questions about domains, DNS, or deployment, feel free to drop your comments below. I’d love to help!